Chasing Infinity
by SkyeRose
Summary: You have sand in your boots and stars in your heart and this time you realize that you have always had the universe at your fingertips. In memory of Carmen Argenziano, our Jacob Carter. OneShot, SamJack


**Chasing Infinity**

**A/N: A drabble of sorts, written with a Kerouac stream-of-consciousness rhythm, so turn back if sentence structure is your thing!**

_**For Carmen Argenziano. For Jacob Carter.**_

**Enjoy!**

Do you remember being little? So little that the universe was infinite? Not because you knew what that meant…but because when you stretched your fingers up, up, up they never touched the sky? And when you closed your eyes and jumped as hard and high as you could, for one weightless second, you could feel the nothing that was somehow full of everything?

But, mostly, you _knew_ it was infinite because your father told you that there are more stars in the sky than there are grains of sand in all the oceans and all the beaches in the whole world. And how could that be true and the sky be finite?

It would be impossible.

Weeks and months and years pass and you slowly start to feel just a little bit bigger and when all the kids around you slowly lower their eyes from the sky and start to focus on what's in front of them, you feel compelled to keep your chin tilted stubbornly into the stars. You count them until you run out of numbers and you vow to learn more numbers so you can keep counting until forever.

So you learn math. And it's the closest you've felt to being able to define infinite and maybe that means there's definition in the sky and an explanation in the stars. Your eyes lower just the slightest.

More years pass and your father stops talking about stars because the light in his life went out and you're finally big enough to understand that infinity isn't real and finite always will be.

You want to feel infinite again, like when you were little. So you throw yourself into math and science and you know that if you want the stars back you'll have to plant your feet firmly on the ground. You decide you want to hold the stars in your hands, not just your heart, so you join the Air Force.

It's something you never thought you'd do, but you did, and suddenly you're graduating at the top of your class and you have an offer from _NASA_ but then you turn it down. It turns out there is more than one way to infinity and working both smart and hard can get you noticed.

An offer you can't refuse.

You have to admire the irony, in order to reach the stars you'll have to sink deep into the ground. It's an impossible task, but you've had your heart set on impossible since you were little and chasing infinity.

More years pass and, it's funny…the bigger you start to feel the more insignificant you realize you are. It's not just stars you've been trying to hold, you realize, but the universe. Planets and people and adventure…and you found a way to reach them all.

But you don't get to go. Not that time. Everyone is too unsure, too scared, too focused on the ground. They don't see what you see. For once, all they see are the numbers and all you see are the stars going out.

Your impossible task made possible is no longer feasible and they shut it down. Too dangerous. Too expensive. Too huge.

But you aren't little anymore and you aren't going to let the universe disappear. You fight.

You win.

You get to _go_.

But first you have to go in that room and face the last obstacle—the last thing between you and infinity. You have to face the man who puts stars in all the cadet's eyes and fear in the officers' hearts. You feel small, so you act big. You see their coldness, so you breathe fire. He makes something shiver in your soul, but you tell yourself nothing is more important than infinity.

You. Are. Going.

More years pass and suddenly your father is there and he tells you he is going to leave, but this time forever and why can't you just honor his last wish, his last request to see you happy? He got you into the space program. He knows how much you love the sky.

Why can't you just make a dying man happy?

But you can't tell him you've already far surpassed everything he could get you and you did it all on your own because he told you about the sand and stars and then he left you to figure out what it all meant. So you did. And now you know what's out there and he will leave you without ever sharing it with you.

But then, a little corner of that secret universe offers a chance, a hope, a life. And your father, the man who made the night sky your home as a little girl, he lives. And he gets to share in this universe with you. For the first time since those telescope night, you are on the same page. You have the same allies and enemies and hopes and fears.

And you cherish the time that you get to spend together. You cherish that your father knows your chosen family and that they cherish each other too.

Years pass in blood and laughter and heartbreak and hope. And then your father is there again. Except this time there is no sliver of the universe reaching out to help, no life to give in exchange for a life saved. And you are there with your father as he presses his chilled palm into your own and repeats a request from all those years before.

Why can't you honor his last wish, his last request to see you happy?

This time is different. You know that you must make the dying man happy. You must honor his wish.

All the while you feel the man who put shivers into your soul and kept the stars in your heart watching from the room above.

Your father is gone, suddenly and expectedly, his last words still swirling in your ears and his hand pressed into yours. He had been given extra time, a new life, a different kind of infinity. He saw and fought and lived and loved. He had his daughter back.

And , for a time, you had the man who sprinkled stars into your head who had, however unwittingly, encouraged you to choose the path that you have now traversed for so many years. A path that led you to your life, your career, your heartbreak, your happiness…the path that led you to you.

And his last lesson was no different. He had not missed his last chance to be right.

Funny.

Now when you stretch your fingers to the sky and the vastness wraps around you, you don't feel the need to chase that infinity. You embrace it. The stars that so desperately called you to action now encourage your steadiness, your peace. In stillness you find that the stars have never been so close, so attainable. You have sand in your boots and stars in your heart and this time you realize that you have always had the universe at your fingertips.

All you had to do was reach out.

After all. Always is just another word for infinity.

**A/N: I hope you enjoyed! This was inspired by one of my favorite quotes, 'The trouble is, you think you have time' (which is from a book with interpretations of things Buddha might have said, I think- I don't know, ask Daniel). I think we spend a lot of time rushing around, reaching for something that we may never attain…and then miss out on all the smaller things we could have set our sights on.**

**Like the opposite of what our main heroine said in 'Grace.' As long as we set our sights on what's attainable, there's no chance of being hurt by something else. But that fear of normalcy and disdain for the average can hurt us too. **

**Keep reaching for the stars, my friends. But don't forget that you have little pieces of infinity all around you as well.**


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